Star wars: Biggest and best celebrity feuds of 2020
It will be a year of the COVID-19 pandemic but 2020 could also qualify as the year of the savage celebrity feud. From Kyle Sandilands and Sam Armytage to Karl Stefanovic and The Veronicas, we take a look at the most entertaining celebrity beefs — so far.
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It will be remembered as the year of COVID-19 but 2020 could also qualify as the year of the vicious celebrity feud, with the likes of Kyle Sandilands and David Campbell, The Veronicas and Qantas and Jessika Power and Stacey Hampton all going head-to-head in a bitter war of words.
And this week two more contenders entered the ring, with Sunrise host Sam Armytage quick to leap onto Twitter to voice her disgust at comments from ABC personality Julia Zemiro.
SAM ARMYTAGE V JULIA ZEMIRO
A fiery outburst by Pauline Hanson on a rival network inadvertently lit a fuse between former RocKwiz host Julia Zemiro and Sunrise’s Sam Armytage last week after the One Nation leader appeared on Nine’s Today describing some of Melbourne’s COVID housing block residents as “drug addicts” and “alcoholics”.
Zemiro took to Twitter to state she would no longer be appearing on either Today or Seven’s Sunrise out of protest — a statement which drew fire from Sunrise executive producer Michael Pell who tweeted that Zemiro had, in fact, not been invited to appear on the show in at least 18 months.
Armytage quickly doubled down, tweeting; “Ladies & gents, I give you ‘The Sisterhood’ in all its glory 2020-style. Also a woman who was happy to take the money of a FTA TV network when it suited her, & host its upfronts.” (Upfronts being the industry term for the annual presentation TV networks give to advertisers, shareholders and media about their upcoming programming slate).
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As for Zemiro’s future as a Sunrise contributor, Pell closed the book on the matter telling The Sunday Telegraph: “Hasn’t been invited. Won’t be invited.”
KYLE SANDILANDS V DAVID CAMPBELL
Nine morning host David Campbell has copped his share of heat from Sandilands in the past, with the KIIS breakfast radio king labelling him “rotten to the core” during a segment in August last year.
It’s understood the basis of their beef stems back to comments about Sandilands made by Campbell “in the media” though examples have never been specified.
“As soon as he had a chance to have a little whinge during one of my many f**k-ups of life, he was one of the ones to first sink the boot in as many people did,” the top-rated radio host said.
“And I thought, f**k you dog! I’ve done the right thing by you the whole time and he just jumped on the bandwagon. He’s just a peasant. Now he’s no friend of mine.”
MASTERCHEF JUDGES V CHANNEL 10
No one is indispensable. That is the lesson learned the hard way by former MasterChef judges Matt Preston, Gary Mehigan and George Calombaris who were unceremoniously dumped by Network Ten after a decade hosting the top-rating cook-off.
The trio were reportedly deep in contract renegotiations when Ten bosses decided to simply cut all three loose in favour of a cheaper and lesser known alternative and, despite some initial scepticism from the TV critic brigade, the show went on to clock one of its highest-rated seasons ever.
KARL STEFANOVIC V GEORGIE GARDNER
It was the long-running war which finally drew one victor when Karl Stefanovic was left the last man standing in a complex network battle over the hosting chair of Today, Nine’s embattled breakfast TV staple.
At first it appeared Gardner would enjoy the spoils, with Stefanovic dumped in late 2018 in the wake of his highly-publicised divorce.
With Deb Knight as his unlikely successor, Today rebranded itself as the woke alternative to Sunrise however viewers continued to abandon the show.
Nervous Nine executives quickly backtracked on their Stefanovic snafu and reinstated the controversial host in 2020 with both Gardner and Knight redeployed.
And the ratings?
Despite the drama; Today has made zero ground while Sunrise continues to surge.
For the year to date, Sunrise is flogging Today by a massive 180,000-viewer margin nationally. Today is now third in its slot behind the ABC.
COLIN FASSNIDGE V CHANNEL 7
The old saying “don’t bite the hand that feeds you” doesn’t seem to have permeated Irish culture — well, not in Colin Fassnidge’s case.
The hot-headed celebrity chef turned MKR judge broke network protocol in a big way this year when he took to AM radio to gripe about Channel 7’s programming department in the wake of the reality cooking show’s lowest-rated season ever.
The fault, he claimed, laid with the fact that Seven waited a week too long to launch the 2020 season and should have premiered the show before the start of the Australian Open which was a huge ratings hit for rival Nine.
“This year was the best one we’ve done but not everyone’s watching it, at the moment, cause we’ve got some people in Channel 7 who don’t know how to program a show,” Fassnidge told 2GB’s Chris Smith.
“But what do I know? I’m only a cook!”
He added: “A lot of work went into this and then some stupid decisions were made to go up against the tennis and Married (At First Sight), we should have started a week early.”
However sources at Seven say it may all be moot with MKR among several shows which have been lobbed in the 50-50 basket in terms of whether it will return in 2021.
THE VERONICAS V QANTAS
In terms of partisan feuds, they don’t get more one-sided (or bizarre) than that inflicted on Qantas by would-be reality stars and former pop princesses The Veronicas who declared war on the airline last September.
Tossed from their September 22 flight from Sydney to Brisbane before the plane left the tarmac, sisters Lisa and Jess Origliasso claimed they had done nothing wrong despite the heavy presence of the Australian Federal Police who escorted them off.
Witnesses would later claim the pair refused to place their baggage in the overhead, were obstructive with staff and, according to fellow passenger ‘Greg’ who spoke to The Courier Mail “They were not following instructions”.
The twins’ version of events had them unfairly targeted in what they described as an “embarrassing” incident which prompted threats of legal action on their behalf.
Conveniently they managed to capture the entire experience on camera and later threatened to air the footage as part of their reality show Blood Is For Life which had a brief six-episode run on Foxtel and MTV.
However it’s understood no legal action has been taken.
JESSIKA POWER V STACEY HAMPTON
“Face like a smacked a**e.”
These five words formed the apex of the ongoing social media skirmish between MAFS alumni Jessika Power (2019) and more recent participant Stacey Hampton with bad blood continuing to boil between the warring blondes.
Power hit a nerve with the comment — a critical observation of Hampton’s alleged cosmetic surgery — which was posted to recap videos recorded in a deal with New Idea and Who Magazine early in this year’s season.
“Face like a smacked a**. … Why is she so grumpy for?” quizzed the 26-year-old, before saying: “Oh maybe that’s just her face all the time — grumpy, sad, happy, excited, outraged.”
It followed an earlier critique that Hampton was “gas-lighting” fellow contestant Hayley Vernon, with Power again taking to Hampton on her mag-sponsored Instagram clips.
But being the self-respecting law graduate that she is, Hampton didn’t take the swipes lying down, declaring she had issued Power with a “cease and desist” letter in the wake of the disparaging comments.
No word yet on any legal action pending.
COOPER CRONK V LATRELL MITCHELL
They once shared a locker room but former Roosters teammates Cooper Cronk and Latrell Mitchell have given some insight into their relationship this year suggesting things may not have been all that rosy between the two star playmakers.
Retired Cronk opened the jousting back in March when he criticised Rabbitoh Mitchell’s decision to blow off training for a week and return to his home town of Taree.
“If I’m being completely honest at this time of year I’m not happy with Latrell taking time away,” Cronk told Fox Sports at the time.
“From my point of view in terms of performance, he’s had a shortened pre-season. It’s Round Two, I think he should be putting that time into getting his body physically prepped for a big season because he needs to have a big one.”
However Mitchell returned fire, revealing he made the decision to leave Sydney with his partner Brielle — who was 38 weeks pregnant at the time — in an bid to protect her and their unborn baby from the COVID-19 pandemic which was then in its early stages.
“I wonder if former teammate and ‘NRL legend’ knew the real reason I took a trip up the highway,” he posted to Instagram.
“Opinionated people need to keep their comments to themselves.”
Ouch.
JOSH REYNOLDS V ARABELLA DEL BUSSO
It’s not often that a sporting ‘he-said, she-said’ spills over into 60 Minutes territory. Alas, such was the apparent drama and intrigue surrounding the bitter break-up of rugby league’s Josh Reynolds and ex-girlfriend Arabella Del Busso.
The latter was paid a significant five-figure sum to appear on Nine’s flagship current affairs program to tell her side of the story which included allegations of a faked pregnancies. (“No”, she didn’t fake them but “Yes” she did use another woman’s sonogram photo to “spite Reynolds” was the ultimate takeaway from the interview.)
The West Tigers five-eighth, whose assault charges against Del Busso were dropped and was later cleared to play in the 2020 season, is now happily single while Del Busso (which is allegedly not her real name) continues to keep us updated on her daily movements via her Instagram account.